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In an e-mail sent to subscribers on Oct. 17 with "Good-bye for Now!" in the subject line, entertainment-on-demand company Intertainer Inc. said it plans to take its Web site down on Oct. 23 until it can iron out a "fair business model" with movie studios that are the subject of an Intertainer-led antitrust lawsuit.

Streaming media technology developer Envivio Inc. and Mexican cable operator Opcion Cable sa de cv will work together to create and distribute a streaming network based on Envivio's MPEG-4 products to provide live and VOD programming to cable operators throughout Mexico. Opcion Cable will use Envivio as its exclusive supplier of MPEG-4 products and services as it develops a hybrid cable televis...

While the market for fiber optic cable and transport gear may be in the middle of a prolonged slump in sales and adoption around the world, the potential for the growth of fiber-to-the-home technologies seems to still be lingering on the horizon. That, at least, was the picture being painted by FTTH companies gathering at the first Fiber-to-the-Home Conference in New Orleans earlier this week.

Free-space optics manufacturer LightPointe received a new patent that builds upon an earlier patent it received for all-optical FSO network design, the company reported. LightPointe's system enables carriers to deploy FSO as a seamless complement to fiber-optic cable in several network applications, including Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing services, metro network extensions, Sonet ring ...

Adelphia Business Solutions (ABS) and its consortium of 13 Pennsylvania-based companies are now 90 percent finished constructing the statewide, 5,000-mile fiber optics based Keystone Communications Project in Pennsylvania. The Keystone Project was designed as a statewide fiber network to bring high-bandwidth voice, data, Internet and video networking to state government facilities, including st...

Canada's Shaw Communications is throwing its arms around subscription-based video-on-demand through a newly signed content deal with Corus Entertainment Inc. The subscription-based service, dubbed Movie Central EXPRESS, will feature films and series from major Hollywood Studios. The service will be marketed as a companion service to Corus' multi-channel pay-TV service to subscribers in Calgary ...

The scientists at Bell Labs have been hard at work trying to find new ways to push the technology envelope. Their latest invention is new prototype chips that would enable wireless devices to receive data at speeds as high as 19.2 Mbps on 3G networks. Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies' research and development arm, said the chips are based on its Bell Labs Layered Space-Time (BLAST) wireless techn...

Akamai Technologies Inc. is making some tough decisions to put expenses more in line with demand by reducing its staff by 25 percent. The Internet content-delivery company said it expects to end the year with 550 employees. It said it will focus its market efforts on its EdgeSuite product line. In the customer department, Akamai plans to continue to focus on enterprise and the federal government.

Copyright 2002 M2 Communications Ltd. TELECOMWORLDWIRE…10/17/2002 From LexisNexis Connectivity services provider iPass Inc. is to offer usage-based pricing for Ethernet and Wi-Fi Internet connections. Under the new pricing plan users of iPass' service will be billed per minute of broadband connectivity rather than the current model of charging a fixed fee for each 24-hour period of service.

Time Warner Cable is rolling out video-on-demand and subscription VOD to digital customers in New York City with the help of nCUBE Corp. Over the next two weeks, TWC will begin offering its Movies On Demand (MOD) and SVOD services to about half of its digital customers in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island.

Six months after seeking protection from its creditors, Williams Communications Group Inc. is emerging from bankruptcy as WilTel Communications Group Inc. The reorganized company also will be looking for a new head honcho. The reorganized company has exited bankruptcy proceedings with a new $375 million credit facility and no other substantial debt obligations other than those related to its he...

Motorola Inc. Broadband Communications Sector has shipped its one-millionth cable modem to the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region. Recent research from Gartner DataQuest predicts that cable modem shipments in the EMEA region will nearly triple to roughly four million units by the end of 2006 compared to 2001.

Consumers interested in next-generation wireless services can choose how they get into the high-speed wireless game from a pool of 200 CDMA2000 devices, according to a recent CDMA Development Group study. The CDMA2000 devices, which are backward compatible with cdmaONE, are available as handsets, personal digital assistants and wireless modems from more than 30 manufacturers.